by Dan Jones<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Palm Sunday is generally regarded as a time of celebration for Christians, and rightly so. We praise our Lord on this day when the very stones would cry out if we were silent.<\/span><\/p>\n But we all know the shadow cast over the triumphant, joyous entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, for the same tongues that shouted “Hosanna” on that glorious day shouted “Crucify”\u00a0just five days later.<\/span><\/p>\n In a lot of ways, it’s bittersweet.<\/span><\/p>\n And the worst part is, we know who’s to blame, for we are no better than any of them who shouted to Pilate, “Let his blood be upon us and on our children.” (Matthew 27:25) Oh, how little did they know how\u00a0God would bless them with the curse they spoke on that day.<\/span><\/p>\n Palm Sunday is rich in imagery, but I believe there’s more going on here. Our Lord was always teaching, guiding, and instructing in all He did and said. And the Bible is packed with an amazing density of meaning. Things in the past or present always seems to have deep connections to the future.<\/span><\/p>\n And so it is with Palm Sunday.<\/span><\/p>\n Take for example, Jesus’ choice of riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. We’re all familiar with this being the fulfillment of prophecy written in Zechariah 9:9, and many theologians have written that the donkey is the symbol of peace. A conquering king would have rode into town on a horse –a war horse. Oddly, the praises the crowd lauded on Jesus were precisely because they thought He was that conquering king who would overthrow the Romans and restore Israel to its rightful status as a sovereign nation. On Palm Sunday, He came not as conquering king, but as servant king.<\/span><\/p>\n But the Bible does indeed describe Jesus riding a\u00a0war horse.<\/span><\/p>\n Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. (Revelation 19:11 NIV)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n The palm branches the crowd laid at His feet\u00a0as a royal carpet are also mentioned in Revelation:<\/span><\/p>\n After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. (Revelation 7:9 NIV)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n You will also remember that this all took place, not in the city of Jerusalem, but on the Mount of Olives overlooking Jerusalem. Zechariah 14:4\u00a0tells what will happen on the same spot when Jesus returns:<\/span><\/p>\n On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives will be split in two from east to west, forming a great valley, with half of the mountain moving north and half moving south. (NIV)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n As for the stones that would cry out in praise if the people were silent, there is\u00a0this passage in Revelation 6 when the sixth of the seven scrolls is\u00a0opened in an eerie reversal of that event:<\/span><\/p>\n Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. They called to the mountains and the rocks, \u201cFall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of their\u00a0wrath has come, and who can withstand it?\u201d (Verses 15-17)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n You will also remember that Jesus and His disciples were coming into Jerusalem from the little town of Bethany, where Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead, as described in John 11. (Kinship Christian Radio is currently playing a song about Lazarus called “You Came.”) Word had reached the people of Jerusalem before his arrival, so a great crowd had come out to meet Him. So, two crowds were converging.<\/span><\/p>\n Revelation 19 describes Jesus’s return to the earth accompanied by all the armies of heaven. Is there a chance what Paul describes in 1 Thessalonians 4 is another crowd meeting Jesus in the air above the Mount of Olives as He returns?<\/span><\/p>\n For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. (Verses 16-17, NIV)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n As for the crowds shouting His praise, prophecy in Philippians, Romans, and Isaiah all say that there will come a day when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. <\/span><\/p>\n And so, on a dusty path\u00a0in a tiny middle-eastern country 2000 years ago, a bunch of peasants and farmers and shepherds and fisherman tore the branches off the trees and threw down their humble garments to praise a Messiah who preached humility, repentance, and love not knowing that this Jesus was not who they thought He was, but much, much more.<\/span><\/p>\n Today’s Praise<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Therefore God exalted him to the highest place<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n and gave him the name that is above every name,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n in heaven and on earth and under the earth,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n to the glory of God the Father.<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Philippians 2: 9-11 (NIV)<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Dan Jones Palm Sunday is generally regarded as a time of celebration for Christians, and rightly so. We praise our Lord on this day when the very stones…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-04 14:20:58","action":"delete","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3683"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3683\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kinshipradio.org\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}